Would anyone else like to know what it's like???

While searching endlessly for research/studies for my part of our final project I stumbled upon a transcript of what looks like a seminar on what it feels like to be a person of color in the United States. Take a look:

http://www.newsreel.org/transcripts/essenblue.htm

I'm stuck...

How come all of a sudden, I cant think of how to start actually writing my project. I'm working with Theima and she is absolutely no help. Okay, okay, she's trying, but I'm really stuck. We're supposed to be looking at how different races act in movies when they assimilate/ penetrate other races characters. We decided to look at different movies like Beauty/Barbershop, White Chicks, Malbu's Most Wanted, and MTV's Blowin' Up. It's not that I dont have a focus, I just dont have a train of thought right now. This sucks.

The Original Bad Boy.....

Well at least for my generation...

Who would've known that the Beast from Beauty and the Beast was actually a bad boy? It's amazing how we never really realize where we develop some of these images we have of what we want until it is blatantly pointed out to you. I never wouldve imagined, even after I have seen this movie sooo many times, that the beast was a bad boy. He yells, he bangs on doors, knocks people around, and tears up families ( you know your average modern day bad boy), hmmm... I'm wondering if it wasn't for this being a Disney movie, would he swear, and possibly beat Belle every now and then.

When watching the movie, and seeing the little girls say that as long as you continue to stay nice, your prince will finally come out of this mean, evil person, I was completely mortified. That's what girls think. That we can change a man from being this awful person into a prince charming. And that's not true.

Now I doubt that Disney can take all the credit for turning us girls into what we've become, however, we learn so much at these young ages, I can't help but believe that Disney is probably the catalyst for most of these images.

Will it ever be the same???

I've been ruined...

No, not really, maybe I'm actually better.

I've been hearing people in class say that they can't watch T.V. the same way anymore. At first I sort of felt that way, (you know seeing stuff that I usually didnt recognize), but now, it's re-G.D.-diculous. Oh my, T.V. is nothing but stereotypes. I cant stand to watch it without being completely and utterly disgusted. I understand that it's supposed to be all fun and jokes, but ha ha hell, that sh*t isnt funny.

I used to enjoy T.V. because it was mindless entertainment, but I actually feel ashamed when looking at T.V. now. It's like "Are you serious? Are you really throwing these loaded stereotypes out at today's youth?"

I know we all say that we dont really pay attention to what the media says, and we can decipher what's real and what's not, but I dont even think that these things should even be thrown out there. These views of minorities, not just blacks, but all minorities including women, are rediculous.

So now that T.V. is no longer my friend, what can I do for entertainment? Read a book??? Hmmm... I dont know how much "fun" that would be, but I know that from now on nothing will ever be the same.

Ghetto???

So here is a topic that has bothered me lately...

ghet·to n.
A section of a city occupied by a minority group who live there especially because of social, economic, or legal pressure.

Why is it that whenever someone (usually non-black) has something or sees something that perhaps doesnt work or it needs a little fixing/rigging they want to call it ghetto? Now I wasnt brought up in the ghetto or anything like that, but that really bothers me that whenever something isnt up to par it's ghetto. I mean, we all know that the ghetto is usually where the projects are, you know government housing, and the majority of people in the ghetto are black. I just dont think that that word should be used so loosely, or at least when it refers to unworking objects.

I know alot of great people who have overcome where they came from (the ghetto) and they actually say that it has helped them overcome many struggles in life today. I know that the ghetto is for low income families, but does that necessarily mean that it has to have a negative connotation attached to it???

You never hear people say that something is "trailer" or "trailer park" when something doesnt work, or it's just "not right."

So why use ghetto???

Just something to think about...

Men and Women in Urban Music Magazines

Men and Women in Urban Music Magazines

Two Sentence Summary Findings
In three major urban music magazines (VIBE, The SOURCE, and XXL) women are shown mostly in suggestive or partially clad clothing, while men are mostly demure in their dress. Most men in these ads were dominant, while women were either shown as vixens or were seemingly psychologically withdrawn from their surroundings.

Previous Findings
In “Beefcake & Cheesecake” (Spring 1999, Journalism & Mass Comm. Quarterly) Reichert, Lambiase, Morgan, Carstarphen & Zavoina found that women are more likely to be shown in a sexual role than men in ads from six magazines ranging from 1983 to 1993.

Important Foundation Literature
The foundation that I based my study upon would be Soley & Kurzbard’s “Sex in Advertising,” (1986, Journal of Advertising) which used a similar coding scale as I have. This coding scale categorizes the dress of the men and women in the ads as demure, suggestive, partially clad and nude. “Beefcake & Cheesecake” found that the amount of sexuality women portrayed in these ads had increased over time.

Corpus and Method
My corpus included looking at every full page ad in VIBE, The SOURCE, and XXL magazines for the month of June 2006. When looking at the ad I coding the individuals in the ads as male or female. After gender, I classified their dress as either demure, suggestive, or partially clad. Then I classified the poses of the individuals as sitting, standing or reclining, and I also coded the view of the cover subject, if it was their head, face, or torso being shown. Both quantitative and descriptive analysis was used in coding these ads.

Findings
In these three magazine I found that men were shown in more ads than women, however when women were in ads they were shown as the object of sexual desire, vixens, or psychologically withdrawn from their surroundings. Most of the ads in these magazine were for clothing so the men were mostly artists shown as masculine creatures, while the women were actually “posing” for the camera. Of the 25 men that were in these ads only 3 were shown as partially clad. Each of these three men were pictured playing basketball in “hoping shorts” and no shirt. Although this is thought of as partially clad, it is however socially acceptable. The women on the other hand were mostly suggestive, with demure coming in in second place and partially clad rolling in in third.

Conclusion
In this study I found similar findings as the study above, however, women were not depicted sexually as much as the “Beefcake & Cheesecake” study. In these urban music magazine men are almost always shown in demure clothing, ( maybe because in the hip-hop-homophobic world, nothing else is acceptable). Women are seen as accessories, and vixens, similar to the music video world.

Crack sells...

Mann.... I really enjoy this class! It's sooo interesting to see what people think about their world. It's also interesting that we all live in the same world but we view it soooo differently.

Anyway... moooving right along...

Do men really buy Playboy, Maxim, or King magazine for the articles???? I dont believe that the vast majority of men do so. If any one of these magazines featured a woman who was fully clothed yet still beautiful, I'm not for sure if men would purchase them. Everyone throws around the thought of "Sex sells," that's cool and all but crack sells just as well, but that doesnt make it good. Just because it makes money doesnt mean that it's morally or ethically correct. Do we want to be reduced to a society that will buy anything including, fish wire, mops, furniture, (and the list goes on...) just because it is sold by sex??? How did this happen? When did everyone get so interested in something that is supposed to be so private and intimate?

Mann... America is nosey. That's why sex is so interesting, because we want to see what we're not supposed to. We have that desire to want what's forbidden.

It's like I'm psychic....

Is it just me, or was thursday's class a complete repeat of what I wrote in wednesday's blog. How interesting am I??? Anyway, I really just wanted to make a comment about a statement that was made in class on Thursday.

Like I've said before I'm sure my classmate didnt mean anything by this comment, but seriously, why would you say that.

"Maybe there wasnt any coverage over her because the media didnt reinforce the negative sytereotype that we already have." *

Or something like that...

Anyway, the girl, whether she was black, white, yellow or red, was a mother and I'm sure she was a good mother, so just because she may have made a mistake in her life and wasn't married before having kids does not make her less of a person. Her kids were a blessing from God and I dont think that that should make a negative stereotype of any person or group of people.

*I'm sure these weren't her exact words.

Was that really a necessary comment???

Today's class was interesting... I was mostly concerned with Tracy Everbach. Now I know she's a wonderful teacher, and a great writer, but one comment she said today stood out more than anything else she mentioned. When speaking about the lack of females on the front pages of newspapers, she somehow felt the need to mention minorities. Now I can't qoute what she said verbatim, but basically it was something like "It's similar to when you see minorities in the paper, they are always complaining because it's usually because of a crime." with a little snicker afterwards.

Am I being too sensitive???

I know that I wasnt the only one who took notice to this comment, because once it was said I looked at a classmate of mine (who will remain nameless) and she had a disturbed look on her face. And while turning to look at Theima (my bad Theima) I saw other classmates glance at us to see our reaction. So this comment certainly sparked some interest.

So my question today is: "Was that really a necessary comment?"

In my opinion she somewhat just reinstilled the typical stereotype of minorities to the thoughts of my fellow classmates . I dont think that this example was needed to make her point effective. Many other examples could have been used.

I think that normally that comment wouldnt have made much of an impact to me. I believe that being in this RACE, GENDER, and MEDIA class makes me more aware of certain issues and topics that I thought I had become immune to. I had become so desensitized to naive comments made that I guess I kinda forgot what it felt like to be offended, even if it is unintentional.

Anyway, I'm sure Tracy meant nothing by it, and I respect her the same, I just needed to get that off my chest.

"Until people wake up, and raise hell"

Today's topic is about the media coverage for war hero, Jessica Lynch, and the lack there of for equal, but black, war hero, Shoshanna Johnson. In many articles all over the web and on the front page of Time Magazine, you can find endless praises for the courageous, young blonde, Jessica Lynch and how she survived being a prisoner of war. However when searching for coverage of her comrade, fellow hero, and black prisoner of war, findings are slim.

Would I be jumping to conclusions if I assumed there was a lack of media coverage because she was a black individual, who was a prisoner of war for 22 days longer than Lynch? What about if I said it was pure prejudice that Johnson was cheated when she only received a 30% disability when Lynch received 70%? Let's also keep in mind that Johnson was actually shot by the Iraqi's and Lynch was only injured in a truck accident.
Wait a minute...... maybe Lynch received 70% because of all the media coverage and not because of the military's standards. But if that is so, whose fault is it that this young, black mother receives more than $700 less than Lynch per month? The media or the military.

Does the media have that much of an influence on today's society.... let's go further and ask if the media has that much influence on the government? (that's a scary thought)

Looking through a few online postings I ran across some excerpts of a poem that was written for Shoshanna Johnson, I thought it was quite creative and deep so take a look and tell me what you think http://www.musicforamerica.org/node/340

Is it because.....

So earlier last week I was disturbed at work because I had the slightest feeling that I was being stereotyped.
Let me run this down to you...
I ask a new co-worker of mine if she would be able to switch Saturdays with me because I wanted to attend a concert. Being the curious girl that she is, she asked "what concert?"
I replied, "The Essence Festival."
She in return said, "You would go to the Essence Festival." in a very cynical manner.
Now I didn't say this as we spoke, but I was thinking, " Why? Is it because I'm black?"
Lets keep in my mind that I hardly know this girl, she just started working with me about a week prior to this incident, so she doesnt know anything about me or the type of music that I listen to. Disturbed by what she had said, I asked her why she thought that.

She replied "You just look like you like that horrible music" (oh yes the insults keep coming).

Now I know I may be reaching when I ask this, but why is the music so horrible, is it because the artists are black??? I can see if it was controversial rap or something like that, but no, this was soulful R&B. Music that I think is great. Music that actually has some sort of meaning to it.

Sooo.. back to the subject at hand, let's address the comment about "looking like" I would go to the Essence Festival. Okay, Okay, I must say that it is a mostly black event, however, white people be there too. So other than the color of my skin, there's no reason why she would assume that I would attend the Essence Festival. I dont know seemed real stereotypical of someone like that. And when I say someone like that, I mean someone who is extremely judgemental and closed-minded. Maybe I'm wrong, how would you feel if it happened to you??????